Sunday, July 30, 2017

Thursday, July 27, 2017

Monday, July 17, 2017

Back in high
school (a loooong time ago...I'm surprised I can remember that far back), I
submitted an essay in a writing class; it was about depression.I was listing the sad ills of my depressed
state, one of which was: "I can't
write..."My writing teacher
scribbled in the margin--"But
you're writing here, aren't you?"Touche.

Then again,
there's writing, and there's Writing.When I scribble pages upon pages of my personal angst, that's
writing.What I want to create is "Writing:"Polished essays about things that matter.I don't do that too much anymore.Partly because I seem to have lost the
muse...and partly because the things that matter are so fucked up that I can't
even go there.

The world is
insane, and screwed up, and unbelievably damaged.The USA has led it into a place of
unfathomable decline; a place where bullying, crassness, chest-beating and
ignorance rule.Where education is
disrespected (yet, we are all told we need a college degree get a job that
earns better than slave wages;) where the desire for peace is labeled weakness; where "leaders" guide
legions of sheep-like followers wherever the politics of fear, aggression and contempt for"otherness" can take them.

Our country
is a mess; and it's been a mess so long that we are beginning to accept this
hideous tangle of dishonesty, cyber-bullying, blowhard policy and collusion
with unfriendly foreign powers as "normal." We understand that our nation has become a
tragi-comedy on the world stage; but we can't do anything about it, so we just
retire studiously into our own little lives and do our best to ignore the
insanity.We are not Don Quixote.We're too smart (too exhausted?too disheartened?) to tilt at windmills.So we just...don't.

I don't find
anything motivating about this state of affairs.All it inspires is disbelief, then anger, then
hopelessness.That kind of muse makes
for bitter, cynical writing.Not only am
I tired of dwelling in that place, but I firmly believe that it's the last
thing anyone needs to read right now.It
only adds fuel to the fire that is consuming everything good, positive and
hopeful about our society and our world.

So when I
say "I can't write" these days, my reasons are sound.And sad.

Tuesday, July 11, 2017

Friday, July 7, 2017

I belong to the “Concerned
Citizens of Columbia County” Facebook page.

Last Monday, one of my fellow
“concerned citizens” posted this;

There
will be loud fire works all night long tonight and tomorrow, probably really
late or early lol, dont post 1000 things bitching about it,! Its America! Take
your scared little yapper dogs and move to Russia if you dont like it!

…even though the “pinned post”
that heads the page specifically mentions that “This page is not to be used for
venting…[and] We will delete comments that contain bashing, unproductive
arguments, or where there is childish name calling involved. If we continue
seeing the same people doing it, we will simply delete/ban them.”Inexplicably, this post and its 177 mostly
ugly and ignorant comments stayed up for four days before Admin took it down…I guess that last comment (mine) about how we
should be kind and courteous to our neighbors when it came to our holiday
celebrations was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

The private use of
high-powered fireworks has gotten completely out of hand in the past couple of
years.Time was, here in Oregon, when
people would purchase armloads of the legal fireworks sold at fireworks
stands around the state for two weeks before the holiday, drag them out onto
the driveway after dark on the Fourth, and light up the night for a couple
hours.And save the rest for New Years
Eve.You would be surprised at how
awesome the legal fireworks are.WAY
better than anything we ever had as kids back in Illinois, where the only legal
“fireworks” were punks and snakes.Anything that sparked or flew was verboten.We used to hide behind our garage to light
the sparklers we smuggled over the border from Wisconsin.

These days, more and more folks
have jumped on the scofflaw bandwagon, toting crates full of high-powered
rockets and bombs sold on the Indian reservations (because state laws do not
apply on the reservations) back here to suburban Oregon neighborhoods.Where they proceed to treat the rest of us to
at least seven nights (and sometimes days) of explosions, shrieking, acrid
smoke and panicked dog-barking.

And since these fireworks are
illegal, the law-breakers don’t set them off in the street or in open fields,
where at least the neighbors could keep an eye on where they’re coming from and
where they’re going.These idiots set off
their contraband in their back yards behind 6 foot wooden fences.So all the neighbors can do is duck and cover;
and wonder when a mishandled rocket might come crashing through the fence, land
smoldering in their bark mulch or ignite their shake roof. Apparently, the local
gendarmerie has neither the will nor the resources to control the situation.So on it goes.Bigger and badder every year.

For the most part, I have
been happy enough to live and let live.Batten
down the hatches, keep the animals indoors, shut the windows and play the TV
really loud.But this year…this year
broke MY camel’s back.

Here is my story:

I have a five-month-old puppy.Said puppy accompanied us to our working weekend/holiday
at the beach.She spent much of 72 hours
on the leash or restrained in her crate.She does okay under those circumstances, but enough is enough.When we got home, she loved getting back to
her place and her routine.

Part of her routine is to be
taken for a walk around 11:00 each night, where she does her final business
before bed.For whatever reason, she can
no longer be enticed to do this business in the back yard.It’s outside, on the leash, around the
corner, or no go.

When 11:00 rolled around on
Tuesday night, we attempted to do the walk thing, only to be foiled by cracks
and bangs and flashes and showers of sparks on every driveway—the legal
fireworks; and louder, more ominous booms and explosions from behind the
houses.Dog was not having any of
it.Though she didn’t cower in terror
and try to run away and hide, she was WAAAY too distracted to perform the task
for which we were out on the street.

We turned around and went
back in the house.

Half an hour later, the ear-splitting
booming from next door was still going on.Trying to resist the urge to fall down and cover my head every time I heard the loud “Whoomp!!!” of one of those things
leaving its launching pad, I finally hollered out the back window—“Can you just
GIVE IT A REST already??!?!?”

Wonder of wonders, all became
quiet a few minutes later.

So I grabbed the dog, clipped
on her leash and headed out the door in a desperate attempt to get her to perform
her late evening duty so we could both go to bed.

We tiptoed down the block, my
head swiveling from side to side, on the lookout for people, sparks, smoke…anything.No one was around.Hallelujah.

We got almost to the end of
the block when, from somewhere frighteningly nearby, a huge tumult of sparking, spitting, popping
and booming ensued.I turned around and saw
that someone had dragged a gigantic can of repeater roman candles out into the road
and lit it, maybe 20 yards behind us.My
next-door neighbors had decided to risk the non-existent law enforcement and take
their show out into the street.

One after another these
things shot out of the can, flying fifteen or twenty feet in the air, and
exploding—loudly—in a bright shower of sparks, practically right above our
heads. Dog freaked out.I freaked out.Are you
FUCKING KIDDING ME???

“You stupid son-of-a-bitch!!!What the hell????”

“What?What’s wrong?What’s your problem?”

“Oh my GOD!You scared the crap out of my dog!!!!!!”Let me get my dog in the house and you can
light off all the goddamn fireworks you want!

“That was not our intention…!”

“Whatever, dude…”

There was not a big fight
after that.I gathered my dog, stormed
back down the street, past the assholes, studiously not making eye
contact.I was not proud of the way I
had screamed at them.Nor was I
completely sure that I wouldn’t go back on the rampage if I even looked in
their direction as I passed them.

So that is what our
neighborhoods have become.Holiday
battle zones.Isolated little bands of
adversaries, aggressively doing anything the hell they want any time they want, and
fuck you if you don’t like it.Move to
Russia.

I like to see a man proud of the place in which he lives. I like to see a man live so that his place will be proud of him. --Abraham Lincoln

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Where I'm From

I am from station wagons, from kool-aid and turf-builder.
I am from the three bedroom, one bath ticky-tacky box
with the swath of weedy lawn; from lightning bugs,
June bugs, and mosquitoes the size of small birds.

From nights near as hot as the days,
spread-eagled on sticky sheets
crickets creaking, horns honking,
trains rumbling and whistling in the distance…

I am from snow to the eaves, jewel-studded ice storms
and green-black thunderstorms with sideways rain.
I am from bright red tulips, honeysuckle berries,
and worms on the driveway after a cloudburst;
from daisies, tiny wild strawberries, “Queen Anne’s Lace”
and crashing the kite into power lines.

I am from “Look what followed me home from school”
and never having too many animals. From Taffy and Rusty
and Sunny, the yellow headed parakeet, who could say
“Happy Birthday” but only when he thought
no one was listening…

I am from the women who shuttle the carpool,
punch the clock, scrub the toilet,
then climb into the bottle, the herb
or the fantasy to quiet the noise in their heads
and the men they choose to rescue
or who choose to rescue them.

From “When you meet the right one, you’ll just know”
and “Your dad was a virgin when we were married…”
I am from the dutiful eldest daughter who paired off
home made and pro-created at the appointed time,
and the other four who didn’t.

I am from the tearful Catholic and the stoic agnostic;
the rope stretched taut between belief and unbelief,
pulled one direction, then the other…
the eternal tug of war never won.

I’m from pioneers of urban exile; before the country clubs and the soccer and the Rolls Royces.
I’m from the first McDonald’s and the last Tastee Freez.

I am from the great moldering box in the upstairs closet;
roaring twenties sepias stacked on
shiny square instamatic shots, discoloring with age.
I am from the five stair-steps, the Christmas trees, the campfires,
and the blurred mountains captured from a moving car.

I am from the unlikely union of a country boy and a city girl,
brought together by Hitler and Hirohito;
and the neighborhood of compromise
that kept them both sane…almost.

On Where We're Destined to Go...

As for life, I'm humbled,I'm without wordssufficient to say
how it has been hard as flint,and soft as a spring pond,both of theseand over and over,
and long pale afternoons besides,and so many mysteries beautiful as eggs in a nest,still unhatched though warm and watched overby something I have never seen -a tree angel, perhaps,or a ghost of holiness.

Every day I walk out into the world to be dazzled, then to be reflective.It suffices, it is all comfort -along with human love,
dog love, water love, little-serpent love,sunburst love, or love for that smallest of birdsflying among the scarlet flowers.There is hardly time to think about
stopping, and lying down at lastto the long afterlife, to the tendernessyet to come, when time will brim over the singular pond, and become forever,
and we will pretend to melt away into the leaves.As for death,I can't wait to be the hummingbird,can you?

Mary Oliver

"Sometimes I go around feeling sorry for myself; and all the while I am being carried by the wind across the sky." --Chippewa saying.